Wednesday, August 21, 2013

However hard the authorities try to twist
reality, we can tell the difference between activism and violence, victims and
perpetrators

Hit by waves of protests over the past
month against state-sanctioned forced evictions and demolitions, the Ma
Ying-jeou (馬英九) administration has been very creative in how it characterizes the
incidents, defining (for prosecutorial purposes) mere misdemeanor as crimes,
and spray-painting, egg-throwing and sit-ins, as “violent.”

It’s obvious that in portraying the
activists as “violent,” the government hopes to discredit them and thereby turn
public opinion in its favor. It hopes to create the image of a law-abiding,
rational government repeatedly assailed by groups of young, irrational and
violent individuals — Dostoevsky’s demons, if you will. Reasonable Cabinet ministers offer
to sit down and have tea; unreasonable protesters respond with slogans, flash protests, and
“raids” on ministry buildings.

Minster of the Interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) pushed that concept further
earlier this week when he likened the incident at the MOI during the night of
Aug. 18-19 to attacks on McDonald’s outlets. Silly comparisons aside (for all
its ills, McDonald’s isn’t in the business of governance, nor does it tear down
people’s homes), Lee should know better than to compare the affixing of “fuck
the government” stickers and the spray painting of graffiti to smashed windows. He
should also know that for more than three years before the recent incidents, victims,
supporters, NGOs and lawyers had exhausted every legal means possible to
resolve the matter, all in vain.

The only real violence in the Dapu (大埔) and
Huaguang (華光) cases, to
name just two, has been perpetrated by the state apparatus against ordinary — and
in many cases defenseless — citizens. Besides the demolitions, the state has
also levied heavy fines and filed various lawsuits against individuals and
families who fought back, a form of economic violence whose impact on the
victims’ livelihood is quite severe. In some cases, it is devastating. Violence
is tearing down a home with all the occupants’ personal effects still in it,
which were subsequently dumped, tattered, dirtied, into a field, creating
images reminiscent of cities devastated by a hurricane. It is the psychological
damage caused a father who has developed clinical paranoia as a result of the
ordeal.

At the Jhunan coffee shop

Violence is the smashing, by an unknown
individual, of the windows at the Jhunan (竹南)coffee shop in Miaoli County, where activists involved in the protests against
the Dapu demolitions usually gather to discuss their plans. Violence is when
Chen Wei-ting (陳為廷), a
charismatic student activist who has spearheaded the protests in Miaoli, is
informed (as he wrote on his Facebook page today) that a certain “government
official” has allegedly instructed local gangsters to “take care of him.” There
is an abundance of violence in Miaoli, which under the commissionership of Liu
Cheng-hung (劉政鴻), a
perfect imitation of the local Chinese despot type, has very fast turned into
Taiwan’s version of the “Far West.” It manifests itself in Liu’s turning the
local police force into his personal militia, when a police officer walks by
a peaceful candlelit vigil near Liu’s home bearing an assault rifle, or when a
senior police officer orders media he doesn’t like to be “taken out.” It rears its ugly head when
InfraVest, a German wind power firm, relies on the local police force and hired thugs to beat up local villagers in Yuanli (苑裡) who oppose the
construction of the wind turbines much too close to their homes.

All these are instances of violence —
physical, psychological and economic. However hard the authorities try to twist
reality, we can tell the difference between activism and violence, and between
victims and perpetrators. (Top photo by the author, second photo by the Defend Miaoli Youth Union)

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About Me

Taipei-based Senior Non-Resident Fellow at China Policy Institute @ U Nott, associate researcher at CEFC, ed.-in-chief Thinking Taiwan. M.A. War Studies Royal Military College of Canada, International Diploma in Humanitarian Assistance from CIHC, CX-77 (peacekeeping) Lester Pearson Peacekeeping Centre, B.A. English lit. Deputy news editor and a reporter at the Taipei Times 2006-2013. Intelligence officer for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (2003-2005). I have been published in the Wall Street Journal, Christian Science Monitor, SCMP, National Interest, Lowy Interpreter, The Age, Jane’s Defence Weekly, Jane’s Intelligence Review, Jane’s Intelligence Weekly, Jane’s Navy International, Jane’s International Defence Review, the Ottawa Citizen, China Brief, CounterPunch, FrontLine Security, Strategic Vision, Asia Today International, The News Lens and The Diplomat. I was the 2012 recipient of the award for Outstanding Journalism from the Chen Wen-chen Memorial Foundation. I have appeared on BBC, CBC, CNN, VOA, RTI and Al-Jazeera. I use a Nikon D7100 camera. Follow me on Twitter @jmichaelcole1